Because of the Indigenous Peoples Day/Columbus Day holiday, this is the last issue of Shelf Awareness until Tuesday, October 14. See you then!

Mis Amores Bookshop, a romance-focused bookstore and coffee shop, will open this weekend in Knoxville, Tenn., WBIR reported.

Mis Amores Bookshop's Anya Anderson

Located at 5331 Central Avenue Pike, Mis Amores will carry a diverse selection of romance titles prioritizing characters from marginalized communities. Owner Anaika (Anya) Anderson, who was born in the Dominican Republic and learned English as a second language, told WBIR that she plans to stock books in multiple languages and host classes in English, Spanish, and American Sign Language.

Per WBIR, Mis Amores is also the first Black-owned coffee shop in Knoxville. Anderson commented: "I don't want to take somebody else's shine away from them, but it feels huge, monumental, and it's a lot of pressure. I hope that I can bring honor to our culture and to our community and then also pave the way for other individuals like myself, and I think this is just the beginning. I think that Black-owned businesses are gonna continue to grow in Knoxville, and I cannot wait to see them."

Anderson explained that her family moved from Florida to East Tennessee following the death of one of her children, and once in Tennessee she wanted to create a place where people could gather, feel safe, and see themselves reflected in books.

Last month, Anderson launched a GoFundMe campaign to help her open the bookstore and coffee shop that raised more than $2,700.

Book House's current location

The Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza in Albany, N.Y., is moving to a new location within the same retail plaza, News10 reported.

The 49-year-old bookstore has moved a number of times within Stuyvesant Plaza and is actually returning to its erstwhile home. It will also be moving closer to the Lawn, an outdoor space used for community activities. 

"This new location was the Book House's home during the 1980s when we went through a big growth spurt," explained store owner Susan Novotny. "The Lawn at our doorstep will be a big plus for book-signings and will add another dimension to our events."

Per News10, Stuyvesant Plaza officials said the move will occur "within the coming months."

Andrews McMeel Publishing has named Tim Paulson executive vice-president and publisher, effective October 21. 

Tim Paulson

Most recently the director of the University of Kansas Press, Paulson is the second publisher of Andrews McMeel Publishing, after Andrews McMeel Universal CEO Kirsty Melville, who was the first. In addition to his tenure at University of Kansas Press, where he presided over the launch of the Plainspoken Books imprint, he was v-p and publisher of Nelson Books at HarperCollins Christian Publishing. He also worked at Brentwood Studios and Augsburg Fortress Publishers, and he has worked with authors Lysa TerKeurst, Max Lucado, and Phil Robertson.

"Tim's exceptional experience and entrepreneurial spirit make him an ideal candidate as Andrews McMeel's publisher," Melville said. "We look forward to his leadership and contributions to continue to advance the business and share the work of the remarkable talent we represent."

"I truly look forward to building on the success that Andrews McMeel has achieved over the years through a creator-first and culturally attuned approach to an evolving media and publishing landscape," Paulson said. "Many things change, but listening to your partners and getting close to audiences is key to ongoing success."

Earlier this week, Andrews McMeel announced that it was buying Quirk Books.

Princeton University Press has acquired Island Press, which will become an imprint of PUP, effective January 1, 2026. PUP will assume all publishing and rights responsibility for Island Press publications, including its backlist and its current and future publishing program of titles, which focus on ecosystems, conservation, and biodiversity; food systems, water, and health; and the built environment. 

Noting that Island Press's commitment to "elevate voices of change, shine a spotlight on crucial issues, and focus attention on sustainable solutions" will remain integral to its identity as an imprint, PUP said it will begin marketing and publicizing Island Press titles in January, with the vendor of record changeover set for April 1. 

Christie Henry, PUP's director, said, "Island Press has since its origin been an inspiration in catalyzing change with knowledge. Island Press books have influenced policy, informed global public debate, and empowered individuals and organizations to take action toward a more sustainable, healthier future. Princeton University Press is incredibly grateful and excited to now be a part of that future, and to unite the missions of PUP and Island Press in symbiotic support of the ongoing resilience of ecosystems of knowledge." 

Island Press president and publisher David Miller commented: "Island Press has a long history of reimagining what publishing might be, offering authors innovative ways to reach those working to overcome the environmental threats that the human and natural worlds increasingly face. As we looked to the future, it became clear that we needed a partner that shared both our mission and our entrepreneurial spirit if we were to fully accomplish that goal. In joining with Princeton University Press, we gain a partner widely known for publishing excellence and that shares our passion for finding creative ways of amplifying authors and their work. We couldn't be more excited to begin."

Wednesday's MPIBA FallCon panel discussion on social media action plans for bookstores featured a combination of booksellers and influencers. Miranda Berdhal of Windy City Books, Casper, Wyo., moderated the conversation that included Kelly Brown of Magic City Books, Tulsa, Okla., and David Landry of Class Bookstore, Houston, Tex., as well as Wyoming-based blogger Cathy Holman of PrairieWifeInHeels.com and writer Adam Vitcavage of Debutiful.net in Denver.

(l-r) Cathy Holman, Adam Vitcavage, Miranda Berdhal, Kelly Brown, David Landry

Landry recommended that stores approach different platforms differently, saying, "You can post the same things... but the way that you speak to those audiences has to be different." TikTok users are often younger and more video oriented, so posts with a lot of text don't perform as well as those where the video does most of the talking, while Facebook users tend to be older and more receptive to long-form posts.

Brown added that it's helpful to reshare content from other users when it can be tied into reminders about upcoming events or book releases, something that Holman underscored several times throughout the conversation. It's crucial to build social networking from an aligned set of mission, vision, and values. "Know who you are," said Holman, and communicate that clearly with any staff whose hands touch the store's social media accounts. Let the rest flow from that sense of identity. "It doesn't matter the numbers of people you work with if they align with your values and mission."

"Don't be afraid to be you," Landry agreed, whether that's highlighting quirky employee reading recommendations or collaborating with other establishments that share parallel missions. Holman spoke about forming a book club with Berdhal and Windy City Books, where they lean into offerings by local authors and schedule book signings for the monthly selection. Vitcavage also suggested reaching out to new-media outlets, local media, alt weeklies, newspapers, and others, with non-advertising ideas that can be mutually advantageous, such as writing proprietary listicles that can be cross-posted.

For most of the panelists, developing an identity and voice through these strategies has been broadly successful, with very few setbacks, even when posts veered into politically dicey areas. "You get three swipes for someone to decide if they like you," Holman said, and those who stick around do so because they connect with the mission, vision, and values presented. When negative feedback enters the comments section, it's often drowned out by more supportive ones. But if controversy runs high, it's important to provide staff with a clear plan for addressing complaints. Show compassion to detractors outwardly, even if you don't always feel it inwardly. And remember that even negative engagement is recognized as a reward in the landscape of algorithms.

On a granular level, getting social media to work for a store can be a process of trial and error. Offer in-store customers a QR code to your profiles. Provide links, store info (like hours of operation), and a call to action with every post. Embed links with tracking and pay attention to analytics when determining what successfully produces conversions.

Announce events as soon as they're solidified and increase the frequency of those posts as the date approaches. Tag everybody (authors, publishers, off-site venues) and use hashtags to help broaden your reach. Holman recommended AI generators for producing a variety of text options to include with each post as well as identifying useful hashtags to save time and effort. There are also free and searchable hashtag banks available online, for those who would prefer to do it themselves. But in any case, test each one to ensure they collect the right content.

Creating posts can be a fussy and frustrating process. Don't be afraid to experiment, and if it doesn't work, pivot and move on. At the very least, an awareness of what's popular on social media can be reimagined for store displays. Brown has found success with "As seen on TikTok!" displays, especially during the holidays, when parents and grandparents are seeking gifts for the younger readers in their lives. --Dave Wheeler, senior editor, Shelf Awareness

Tony Harrison, the award-winning poet and dramatist "whose writings fueled national conversations about class, obscenity and politics," died September 26, the Guardian reported. He was 88. A major voice in British poetry since he published his first collection in 1964, Harrison "wrote front-page dispatches for the Guardian from the Bosnian war, and scandalized the nation with his 1985 poem 'V.' Written after football hooligans desecrated his parents' gravestones, the expletive-laden work was described as a 'torrent of filth' by the Daily Mail when it was broadcast on Channel 4, prompting an early-day motion in the Commons. It is now studied in schools."

His poetry explored the tension between his working-class background and the arts, as in the poem "Book Ends," where he wrote of being unable to talk to his father on the night of his mother's death: "Back in our silences and sullen looks,/ for all the Scotch we drink, what's still between's/ not the thirty or so years, but books, books, books."

Harrison's friendship with Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka contributed to his moving in 1962 to Nigeria, where he wrote the play Akin Mata, a version of Aristophanes' comedy Lysistrata with African music and dance. He also published his first poetry pamphlet, Earthworks, there in 1964. After he returned to Britain in 1967, his first poetry collection, The Loiners, won the 1970 Geoffrey Faber memorial prize.

Harrison's 1973 adaptation of Molière's The Misanthrope was his big break at the National Theatre, with adaptations of The Oresteia and The Mysteries following, along with original productions Phaedra Britannica, Bow Down, and The Trackers of Oxyrhynchus, which was based on fragments of a Sophocles play. 

His career spanned theater, opera, film, television and print, but Harrison preferred to be regarded as a poet. In 1987, when Richard Eyre's film of "V" was broadcast, Harrison "became renowned as a public poet, and a fearlessly political one, making headlines again two years later for his film-poem The Blasphemers' Banquet, which was prompted by the fatwa placed on Salman Rushdie and led to the Archbishop of Canterbury asking the BBC to withdraw it," the Guardian wrote. His 1999 film-poem Prometheus reframed the myth as an example of class warfare.

In 1995, the Guardian sent him to Bosnia to cover the war, and a poem written while traveling in an armored vehicle outside Sarajevo made the newspaper's front page. "Why shouldn't poetry address what happened yesterday, and be published in the newspaper?" he told the Guardian in a 2007 interview. "Yes, I've got inwardness and tenderness, but I also get angry and vituperative, and you have to honor that as well." 

When his name came up as a possible contender for the poet laureateship in 1999, he wrote "Laureate's Block," a poem that was published in the Guardian. Harrison wanted to remain "free to write what I think should be written/ free to scatter scorn in Number 10/ free to blast and bollock Blairite Britain." 

Britain's current laureate, Simon Armitage, noted that Harrison blazed a trail, saying in 2000: "He has allowed my generation to do our own thing without having to worry too much about where we come from and what accents we've got. Trying to write in a way that's representative of our voices was a pitched battle for him."

Harrison once said he hoped "the people who knew me will talk about me over a bottle of wine after I've gone.... But what I'm proud of is that I can read poems about my parents in Leeds or Bradford, and men especially are suddenly sobbing in the audience. That a short poem has touched them that deeply and brings that kind of response is better than a rave review."

Cindelle Harris-Blackmon (r.), owner of Cindelle's Bookstore in Plainfield, N.J., posed with Jenan Matari (l.) and her grandfather, the real-life protagonist of Matari's picture book, Everything Grows in Jiddo's Garden (Interlink Publishing), following her reading and signing. 

"If you are a bookstore that’s open for 8 hours you can play life of a showgirl 12 times between open and close just like if you were wondering," Blue Cypress Books, New Orleans, La., noted in a Facebook showcasing the shop's Taylor Swift-inspired "new release" sidewalk chalkboard message:

The Life of a Bookworm
The Fate of Frequent Reader Cards
Kitty Meow
TBR Wishli$t
Mother Figure
Wood(en Bookshelves)
Actually Romantasy
Eldest Fishwife

"The ghosts are back! Hope you enjoy double the themed windows this year--the upcoming expansion means so much more room to celebrate our favorite season," the Yankee Bookshop, Woodstock, Vt., posted on Facebook.

"Baggins has things to say about American Pastoral. Or maybe he is mad about the new rug," Story Line Books, St. Paul, Minn., posted on Instagram. "Come to the Essentials club this Wednesday(October 8th) at 6:30 pm to discuss with him."

Lindsey Odorizzi has joined Candlewick Press, Holiday House, and Peachtree as sales assistant, educational & library. She previously temped for the sales team.

Apple TV+ has unveiled a first look at the second season of the International Emmy Award-winning series Drops of God, the French-Japanese drama set in "the world of gastronomy and fine wines" and adapted from the Japanese manga series by Tadashi Agi, with artwork by Shu Okimoto (Kodansha). The eight-episode second season will premiere January 21, 2026, with the first episode, followed by one episode weekly until March 11. Check out the season one trailer here.

The project is from Legendary Entertainment and stars Fleur Geffrier as Camille and Tomohisa Yamashita as Issei. Apple TV+ noted that in season two, they "are thrust into their most perilous challenge yet: to uncover the origin the world's greatest wine, a mystery so profound that even their legendary father, Alexandre Léger, could not solve it. What begins as a pursuit of legacy becomes a search for truth that spans continents and centuries, unearthing forgotten histories, hidden rivalries and secrets buried for generations. As the search pushes them to the edges of the world, and to the darkest corners of themselves, Camille and Issei must decide how much they are willing to sacrifice. The answer could shatter their bond as siblings... or destroy them both."

Drops of God is produced by Les Productions Dynamic in association with 22H22 and Adline Entertainment. The series is produced by Klaus Zimmermann, directed by Oded Ruskin, and created by Quoc Dang Tran. 

Barnes & Noble has chosen Maggie; Or, a Man and a Woman Walk into a Bar by Katie Yee (Summit Books/S&S) as its $10,000 Discover Prize Winner, honoring the "best new author published this year." The title was voted on by B&N booksellers from the company's monthly Discover picks.

"Finding talented new authors and elevating their work--introducing them to so many readers who might otherwise miss them--is one of the most gratifying parts of being a bookseller," said Shannon DeVito, B&N's director of books. "This year's shortlist sparked vigorous debates with readers each championing their favorite. Ultimately a clear victor emerged, and we are delighted to call Katie Yee the winner of our 2025 Discover Prize."

Fiction campaign manager Lexie Smith commented: "This is one of the most surprising debuts I read this year. Yee takes what could be tragic: a marriage ending, a cancer diagnosis, and turns it into something warm, funny, and deeply life-affirming. This is the book I keep pressing into people's hands when they ask me what to read next."

The five runners-up were:
Kaplan's Plot by Jason Diamond
Great Black Hope by Rob Franklin
Tilt by Emma Pattee
The Artist and the Feast by Lucy Steeds
Lonely Crowds by Stephanie Wambagu

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Sarah Hagger-Holt won the 2025 Little Rebels Award for The Fights That Make Us. In addition to a £2,000 (about $2,675) prize, funded by the Barry Amiel and Normal Melburn Trust, the winner received a limited edition print by Ken Wilson Max. Hagger-Holt is the award's first double winner, having been honored in 2022 for Proud of Me.

Phoebe Demeger, librarian at the Centre for Literacy in Primary Education and a prize judge, praised The Fights That Make Us for drawing "an artful equivalence between Section 28 and contemporary discrimination" and as "an urgent book." Author, teacher, and award judge Alom Shaha, added: "This is the kind of book I'd put into the hands of young readers. I want to see this in schools."

The organizers of the Little Rebels Award called The Fights That Make Us "a beacon of resistance in this current climate."   

photo: Kevin Jantzer

Brian Freeman is the author of more than 30 novels, including the Jonathan Stride series and seven novels in Robert Ludlum's Jason Bourne series. He won the Thriller Award for Best Hardcover Novel and has been an Edgar finalist twice. Photograph (Blackstone, October 7, 2025) is an emotional cold-case mystery of hidden identities and startling twists.

Handsell readers your book in 25 words or less:

It's about a photograph of a little girl from decades ago. Who is she? And why have two people been killed because of her picture?

On your nightstand now:

My tastes are pretty eclectic! I just finished Ione Skye's memoir, Say Everything, and Tracy Borman's history of the British monarchy, Crown & Sceptre. Now I'm halfway through Jungle of Stone by William Carlsen, about the 1830s expedition that uncovered the Mayan ruins. When you write suspense all day, you look for something a little different at bedtime!

Favorite book when you were a child:

When I was a teenager, I'd have to say Trinity by Leon Uris, about the struggles in Ireland. It taught me so much about writing and storytelling. (A first-person novel that kills off the narrator!) But if you go further back, I was a huge fan of the Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators series. I read those books over and over!

Your top five authors:

I really don't like "ranking" today's authors because we have so many fantastic writers in the genre. So I'll mention a few late authors (and absolute masters) whom I miss so much: Nelson DeMille, Peter Robinson, John le Carré, Stuart Woods, and Nelson DeMille. Yes, I mention DeMille twice because he was just so darn good!

Book you've faked reading:

If I told you I'd read Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace, I'd be lying. I mean, I've tried many times. No, I'm still lying. I've never tried.

Book you're an evangelist for:

I read The Magus by John Fowles as a teenager. Still one of the best novels ever. You couldn't find a more different book than my thriller Infinite and yet I explain in the acknowledgments how I was inspired by The Magus when I wrote that novel.

Book you've bought for the cover:

Believe it or not, I really don't pay much attention to covers when I buy a book. For me, it's the subject and the author. (But have you seen the cover for Photograph? Wow!)

Book you hid from your parents:

Ha, it was actually my brother's book. I found it in the attic as a kid--something called The Gold and Glory Guy by Allan Nixon. I remember absolutely nothing about it other than sex, sex, sex.

Book that changed your life:

In 1980, I was 17 years old, and I read an incredible thriller called The Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum. If you'd told me back then that 40 years later(!), Jason Bourne books would be appearing with my name and Ludlum's name on the cover, I'd have thought you were crazy. But here we are.

Favorite line from a book:

"But then the mysteries began." That's from The Magus. I remembered that line for decades after I read the book.

Five books you'll never part with:

I had to downsize a lot when we moved from Minnesota to Florida. But a few books have always stayed on my shelf: The Nine Tailors by Dorothy Sayers, The Magus by John Fowles (see above), The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (see below), Mystery of the Pirate's Ghost by Elizabeth Hoffman Honness (a children's book I can't seem to part with), and of course, my paperback copy of The Bourne Identity.

Book you most want to read again for the first time:

Possibly the best mystery ever written is Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles. I still reread it every year. "It's an ugly business, Watson, an ugly dangerous business!"

Your favorite book among everything you've written:

The Deep, Deep Snow and The Ursulina go hand in hand--two books that read together like one long novel. No matter what else I write in my life, I'll be proud that I gave readers those two books.

Matt Greene's The Definitions is a transfixing and economical dystopian novel, deftly using its scant pages to speak volumes about language and the construction of identity. The unnamed narrator recounts her experience at the Center, a facility designed to rehabilitate its occupants after a virus and a massive data breach that renders them unknown to themselves and to anyone else.

Though the residents of the Center are adults, they must relearn the most basic of concepts as they await the return of their memories and of their words. When the narrator is introduced to her bunkmate, Maria asks, "Do you snore?" and she realizes, "I didn't know. I wasn't sure what it meant to snore. Nor did I know who the you was she was asking about. (I'm still not sure I do, which is why I'm writing this.)" Their acquisition of language contributes to a developing sense of self, a process that should lead to graduation and their reintegration into life outside the Center. But despite their classes on "Advanced Politeness and Intermediary Subservience" and "History of the Twenty-First Century: A Story of Progress," life outside the Center is obscured, an entirely ambiguous goal.

As she writes, the narrator seems to hold language itself as the goal, and through her voice, Greene assembles a dizzying collection of metaphors, each brilliant and revelatory: "Snow fell in asterisks, a million silent caveats." Despite steady growth, the residents don't seem any closer to recalling who they once were, and some start to question the stories they've been told about how they came to the Center. Chino, a resident who has already tried and failed at the reeducation process once, develops multiple theories: there was no virus; there was a virus, but the Center was responsible for it; they are robots. Most, however, accept their fate without question, just as they accept the lessons they are taught--poems have to rhyme, there are two genders, dogs are mythical creatures.

Some of the students at the Center do graduate; others face another term or perhaps a new scheme where the doctors will "transplant a bespoke package of prefab memories" that lead automatically to reintegration. In the end, The Definition offers no tidy resolution; there is no act of discovery or resistance that reveals the truth of the Center and its residents. But the story is thoroughly satisfying, as controlled and complete as a perfectly crafted sentence. --Sara Beth West, freelance reviewer and librarian

Shelf Talker: A fascinating dystopian novel that takes readers inside the Center, a facility designed to reintegrate its residents into society after a mysterious virus steals their memories and their words.